death of innocence
by sea-salt kisses
Summary: All the beauty in the garden cannot stay the hand of death. — Marluxia, Naminé


**the death of innocence.  
****. . .**

With the arrival of the key-bearer, Marluxia's garden begins to die.

The gilded dittanies and burnished gold clivia blacken beneath the bleak sunlight of the castle's dim greenhouse, their petals wilting and curling outward in harsh spirals. The little girl holds the dying blossoms in her hands, strokes the rotting countenance of a rosebud barely out of bloom and knits her brow in confusion. The crusted petals flake off beneath her gentle ministrations, coating the floor in a layer of decay. Sometimes, she imagines the piles of ash as fairy dust, remnants of breathtaking magic — but when her daydreams dissipate, still they lie, hopeless and motionless, rotting reminders of what once flourished with feverish life.

When Vexen disappears, the iced-blue amsonias begin to wither away. Naminé watches with wide eyes and bated breath as they piece apart in her hands. Her teeth clench around a feeling of helplessness, the hollow space between her lungs thrumming softly in time with the tightening of her fist against a feeling of foreboding. She doesn't understand why such beauty is allowed to perish. Naminé looks at herself in the dew pooling across long leaves, studies the curve of her cheek and the pale of her hair, questioning her own ageless half-being.

She takes to spending more and more hours in the garden as her time as Marluxia's ward sprawls onward. The lord of Castle Oblivion visits rarely anymore, and Naminé wonders vaguely if she should be pleased or offended. Regardless, Axel comes in his stead, watching her from his usual place against the garden's glass wall. The witch-princess finds no comfort in visits from the fire-wielder. He is treacherous and dark, filled with a quiet, torrid ferocity that sets her defenses on high. Here in the garden, she holds no power over him. Her sketchbook shield is not allowed within the confines of Marluxia's kingdom, and despite his lack of presence, she finds herself unable to disobey.

Time passes slowly in the garden. Fall turns to winter, and Naminé cries when Larxene's death bids the witch hazel plant burst into flame. When Axel appears in a swirl of fog and blackness, she throws herself at him, beating her frail fists against his chest. She hurls words of hatred at him, of anger and loathe and horrible violence. Her weak, substanceless efforts earn her a spot on the ground, nails dirtying amongst the layer of filth gathering on the floor. Axel's eyes crackle with confusion, disbelief, _disgust_. But then the witch hazel ceases to burn, and Naminé cradles the blackened ashes to her chest, shivering until Axel summons another portal, disappearing as quickly as he came.

The fire-bearer does not return. Winter coats the garden in a thin layer of frost, tinging the blossoms a sickly blue. Marluxia returns in the dead of night, finding Naminé curled around a dying azalea bush, fingers bloody and torn and raw with embedded thorns and scrapes. There is shock and there is bustling, Marluxia's hands gripping tight to the girl's shoulders, shaking her awake. She sees him and breaks into sobs, pleading for salvation, for life, for innocence, eternal innocence – for prolonged beauty and the dissolution of time.

"Everything dies," Marluxia admonishes. Naminé clutches at his coat, burying her face in its chill. The morning light dawns hours later, and she wakens to the hard dirt of the floor and a bone-rattling cold.

When Lexaeus's body returns to the darkness, the bull-rushes and dog's mercury nestled in the garden's back corner parch and dye brown. Their appendages crunch beneath Naminé's grip, and her tears do little to quench and soothe. There is little left in the garden, now. The end of winter draws nigh, the plants seeming to quiver in anticipation, fighting harshly against the stagnancy of the castle, crusading weakly forward in search of survival.

She awakens one morning to find Marluxia staring downward at one of the few plants still thriving. The hyacinths glow an unnatural blue, reminding her of the sea and of the sky and of something so tantalizingly familiar. Words burn at the back of her tongue, spreading a taste of copper behind her teeth. Lips parted, no sound has left her mouth when Marluxia turns. His gaze is dulled, lips drawn tight and expression guarded. She takes tentative steps toward her master, fearing his wrath but wishing nothing more than to plead hopelessly for the rebirth of his flora from the ashes.

As if a parting sentiment, his hand reaches for her. She gasps softly when it touches her cheek, the cool leather not terrifying and foreign as it once was. Instead, she feels—

* * *

Two days later, everything in the garden collapses into dust.

Naminé is on her knees when Axel appears. There is a long moment in which their eyes meet that she finally, _finally_ understands.

Something shelved deep within her begins to break, and when she takes his hand, all she can see are eyes the colour of gentians and rows of pink roses decaying to black.

* * *

**(please review, especially if you favourite the story. a word or two makes all the difference.)**


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